Having somehow endured another Christmas, New York entered the cheerful but slightly crapulous run-up to New Year’s Eve determined not to let the hard mask of amusement slip. Store clerks across the city rejoiced at the imminent cessation of the seasonal Muzak that has been torturing them since well before Thanksgiving, but some New Yorkers were made melancholy when the beloved sidewalk Christmas-tree vendors made their way back to the wilds of Canada. And there were other sadnesses and contretemps. At the Metropolitan Opera, Wallace Shawn was accosted by security and accused—baselessly—of secretly taping the performance of Janácek’s Katya Kabanova. An avowed paranoid, Shawn said the incident taught him “not to leave the house again.” Former state senator and “crybaby crook” Guy Velella contemplated his court-ordered return to jail the Monday after Christmas, consumed as ever by the tenderest self-pity. The scandals surrounding Bernard Kerik continued to multiply, as wags wondered whether Rudy Giuliani would next urge George Bush to consider George Steinbrenner, Donald Trump, or Joey Buttafuoco as head of Homeland Security. The New York Post, after loyally ignoring Kerik’s difficulties for a decent interval, showed its renewed toughness by pillorying, in headline, editorial, and cartoon, a Fifth Avenue beggar named Paula Headley—who falsely pretended to be homeless and in tears. Further up Fifth Avenue, where the Post’s owner will soon move into his $44 million apartment, Pale Male flew hither and yon, new housing materials in beak. Undaunted by a collapsed deal, the Yankees persisted in their quest to sign Randy Johnson—hey, the boy ain’t great-looking, but he has a nice ERA—and newly signed Mets pitcher Pedro Martinez spoke movingly of how God guided him from Boston to New York. When asked if the money didn’t have something to do with it, Martinez replied, “I don’t want you to think I’m some bum on the street.”